


If I Had Known

by DearGoogleIPromiseIAmAWriter (Reveles)



Category: X-Men (Movieverse)
Genre: Beach Divorce (X-Men), Canon Disabled Character, Charles Xavier in a Wheelchair, Gen, Light Angst, POV Raven | Mystique, Paralysis, Post-X-Men: First Class (2011), Raven | Mystique has feelings, Siblings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-22
Updated: 2020-11-22
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:09:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,022
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27663172
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Reveles/pseuds/DearGoogleIPromiseIAmAWriter
Summary: When Raven sees her adoptive brother after a year of no contact post-Cuba, she is horrified to realise the effects the battle has on him
Relationships: Erik Lehnsherr & Charles Xavier, Raven | Mystique & Charles Xavier
Comments: 4
Kudos: 22





	If I Had Known

**Author's Note:**

> Sooo... it's another fic dealing with what happens after Charles is paralysed, I just feel like the movies could have shown a bit more of this and so the idea was bugging me last night and I just had to write it. Also, a lot of fics only deal with Erik's reactions so I thought it would be nice to write this from the POV of Raven/Mystique. I hope you'll like it!

Raven watched as the black car pulled up outside of the ordinary-seeming suburban house. She knew what really was happening inside that house though, a young mutant teenage boy who was afraid of his powers, afraid of himself. That was why she and Erik were here, to help the boy escape, to help to explain to him, and to recruit him for their cause, though it seems that her adoptive brother had a similar idea.

Ever since the events on the beach in Cuba, Raven had neither seen nor heard from Charles, her last memory of him being him lying in the sand with a bullet wound in his back. She couldn't deny that she worried about him, hoped that someone was preventing him from his tendency to throw himself into his research and forget his other needs whenever he was worried. But she had made her choice, and he had made his, their diverging paths making it so hard for her to see him again, almost impossible to. So much so that she had grown to dread it, fearful in seeing the man that had been the one unchangeable variable in her life for so long.

She watched alongside Erik, as Hank (significantly less blue and beast-like than the last time she had seen him) got out of the drivers seat and walked around to the boot of the car. Hearing Erik scoff beside her, she turned to give him a questioning glance.

"What?" she asked, one blue eyebrow arched

"He's using Hank as a servant. Look," Erik waved his hand towards the car where Hank was struggling to lift a folded metal object out of the car, "Our dear old friend isn't even helping,"

"That's not like Charles," Raven replied, confused. The Charles she had always known would have helped someone with anything, regardless of how hard or easy it was. She used to joke that the only thing that could ever stop him would be if he was physically unable, even then she was sure he would find some telepathic way to do it.

"Yes, he always was quite the gentleman," Erik agreed "I wonder what has changed, perhaps ordering all of his students around has inflated his sense of self-importance,"

The two watched as Hank unfolded the object, and Raven could feel her heart sink when she saw it was a wheelchair. It had been just over a year since Cuba, Charles shouldn't need something as drastic as that anymore. Perhaps, she hoped, it was for another person, someone they had recruited for the school she and Erik knew Charles was opening. Though the hope was quickly crushed when she saw Charles open his door and transfer from the car seat into the wheelchair with practiced ease, as if he had been doing it for a year, which, she supposed, he had. Raven felt her hand fly to her mouth, holding back a sob as she watched Charles adjust his legs with his hands, so that they were sitting properly in his chair.

Her shock was so great that she almost missed the gentle brush of Charles's mind, not prying, merely noting her presence. Raven watched as Charles wheeled around to face them, his calm blue eyes meeting hers with an expression so carefully guarded she couldn't decipher it.

"Raven," he said calmly before looking beside her, "Erik,"

"Charles, what- what happened?" she asked, her voice trembling as she took a tentative step towards him.

"Complete paralysis from the waist down," Charles replied flatly, in that matter of fact tone he always used when he was trying to keep emotion out of his voice, and Raven felt her heart break even more.

"No, no! That can't be true!" she exclaimed, shaking off the hand Erik had placed on her shoulder in a futile attempt to comfort. Though who was meant to be comforting who was unclear.

"I'm afraid it is," came Charles's response

"No! It's not! Charles, stand up!" she demanded, storming over to him

"I can't, Raven," Charles said softly, some of the pain in his voice seeping out of the cracks in his calm demeanour.

"Yes you can, damnit!" Raven replied, roughly pulling him up out of the wheelchair and into a standing position. As soon as she let go, he crumpled to the ground, his legs refusing to bear his weight.

"No, I can't," he repeated, rubbing his arm angrily from where it had collided with the rough asphalt of the road in an attempt to break his fall. Raven stared in shock as Hank rushed to Charles's side, ready to help him back into the chair, though Charles waved him off. "I can do it myself Hank. I'm paraplegic, though I'm not completely hopeless,"

As he pulled himself back into the chair, Raven brushed a tear off her cheek, "If I had known, I would have stayed," she said

"As would have I," Erik added, looking at Charles's wheelchair with great sorrow

"And that is why I never told you," Charles said firmly, "I don't want your pity,"

"But we could have helped you! Back on the beach, if we hadn't have left you might not be like this!" Raven replied

"No, the bullet completely severed my spinal chord. You staying would have made no difference," Charles told her

"We should have been there for you," she whispered, her words mirrored in Erik's expression

"Perhaps you should have, but you were not," Charles replied coldly, "After all, we want different things. And we cannot change the past,"

"Charles- I, I'm sorry," Raven said, brushing another stray tear from her eye

Charles's expression softened, "You have nothing to be sorry for, I simply stood up at the wrong moment. Besides, as I said earlier, we want different things now, my sister. I refuse to hold you back. Now, if you will be so kind as to excuse me, Hank and I have a child to see,"

"Goodbye Charles," Raven said, and the sentiment was echoed by Erik

Charles looked at them sorrowfully as he turned his wheelchair to face the house, "Goodbye Raven. Goodbye Erik,"

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed this! I would love to hear any feedback you have for me on this and it would also mean a lot to me if you could leave a comment or a kudos, but don't feel like you have to! I hope the rest of your day/night is awesome!  
> ~DearGoogleIPromiseIAmAWriter


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